Lorewise we're just the 'units' of the armies. Like in Warcraft 3. We're the footmen, riflemen, wolf rider and grunt.

Warcraft III wise, we might be close to the "hero" units (not even near the main lore characters of course) - paladins, mountain kings, mages etc. The regular guard NPCs of cities would count as footmen/grunts/archers and so on.

Exactly...
People seem to neglect how many times we die in the game, while the NPC's we are working for do not.
If the game was more dynamic realistic, there'd barely any original toons left in the game anymore that went from Vanilla to MoP, if any at all.

"The pen is mightier than the sword.. and considerably easier to write with."

We are a big deal. We are tasked with very important quests and missions that only the greatest of heroes would be granted. But take it with a grain of salt. There cannot be 7M great heroes in Azeroth. But in your game you are the shit. We are constantly being hailed as great heroes and champions of our respected factions. Hero class from WC3 status is a good example. There were a big deal and so are we.